Dreams that Live
by Aowlas Greenleaf
Summary: Dreams are important to have, no matter how unlikely. But dream your life away and you will miss everything that your biggest love has to offer. Don't live life the way I started. I missed my chance, but it came around again. Life might not be that kind t


A/N: Okay this is my first time writing on fan fiction and I really don't know what I'm doing, so I'll just pretend. I really really want feedback please because hopefully it'll make my story better or just my writing in general. I've been told my stories were great in the past but I want to see what really critics think. So here for your enjoyment is Chapter One:

"This is stupid! I don't want to do these stupid journals! It's not like they can see into our minds or anything. Most of them are just random anyways, like the one where I jumped off an elephant in the Gobi Desert," she whispered. Sniggers and murmurs from the class erupted all around the room. Professor Trelawney glared at the students and they became slightly silent, but not much.

They were sitting in the dark, dank classroom with the Professor, who was supposed to be teaching them divination. Her eyes still magnified to make her look like a giant bug. Her hair was flowing down around her shoulders. This was a slightly new concept for her. Normally it was tied in a loose bun at the top of her head and had shawls draped around her. Today there were no scarves or bangles to make her look and sound as the creepy teacher her students had gotten used to. She seemed a bit preoccupied and didn't really care if the class was hearing her or not. All she wanted to do was get through her lesson.

The dark classroom was stinking of perfume and needed a serious airing. The table at the back and centre of the classroom was too far away from a window for a student sitting there to get up walk across the room and open a window without causing a commotion.

"Didn't you quit this subject three years ago Hermione?" Ron whispered. He started fiddle with the hem of his robes. The semi-formal was coming up in November and he didn't want to look like he was wearing girls' clothing again. He was fairly interested in why Hermione was in the class but the semi was also taking up a large portion of thinking space in his brain. She also seemed to want the attention and he didn't want to be the one to make her unhappy and start screaming again. He really didn't mind she was there. In fact he was quite glad. Still, the thought of looking like a female at the Tri-Wizard Tournament was bad enough without Hermione blabbing on and on about this stupid class every waking hour and interrupting his concentration.

Hermione rolled her eyes. He was doing exactly what she had hoped he wouldn't. The only reason she was taking this ruddy course again was to be near him. She felt she was missing something when Harry and the rest of the Gryffindors were up in this dark, dank and musty classroom with Ron. Well at least that was what she was telling herself. In truth, it was a lot more than that. There was something much larger happening than a kid in school, which made it necessary for her to take this course again.

(A_ week before divination class, in Professor Dumbledore's office.)_

"Professor, I'm having the dreams again. Lavender keeps waking up when I scream at night. All the girls in the dorm wake up. Can you make the nightmares stop, please?" She was desperate for a quick solution. Having grumpy roommates wasn't high on her agenda.

"Hermione, it is not what I can do for you, it is what you can do for yourself." Dumbledore replied, "I believe that you need to start a 'Dream Diary' from which your thoughts can be organized and interpreted to the best of your ability. Like what my pensive does for me."

"Can't I borrow it for a couple nights. Just until I figure out these blasted dreams." She scowled at the thought of them. She started grumbling and swearing under her breath while staring out the arched window. She had never really understood why Dumbledore had kept all those trinkets in his glass cupboard behind his desk. This answered her inquiry. They all served a purpose and they all helped him. Hermione was standing on the first floor of a spacious room. The room looked like it went on and on forever upwards. In fact the ceiling was bewitched much the same way as in the Great Hall to look like they sky. She saw above her, a second level of the room attached by a magnificent golden stairway near the right side of the room. Portraits of all the former Headmasters of Hogwarts were lined neatly along the wall of this floor. The room was decorated quite nicely, and memories of Dolores Umbridge floated back into her memory, when the room was pink and there were tea cosies on everything. This almost made her spit up but she held her cookies.

"It is important for you to find your own connections because they will only make sense to you and your previous dreams." Dumbledore said patiently. His dark green robes were spread out all about him and he sat like a king on a throne. "I can't tell you what you are seeing. Only the person having the dream fully understands the true meanings."

All that Hermione could think of saying was "Oh." It did seem to make sense that she would be the only one able to interpret the dreams but they were different than her normal dreams. They were something that she had never heard or seen before. It was like someone else's memories. 'Maybe in a book!' She thought. That was the only explanation that she could think of to help her embrace the confusing dreams of the past she kept having over and over, every night until she woke up screaming. Dumbledore had decided that, even though it was already two months into the term, he would put Hermione back into a divination class with Professor Trelawney.

Hermione thought about what the headmaster had said all week and finally her first day of divination class came.

_(The beginning of Hermione's Divination class) _

She went to her class and sat down beside Harry at their normal round table near the back of the room and pretended to listen to what Professor Trelawney was ranting about. Hermione spent the entire time zoned out, staring out the window. She did, however catch the end of the lesson.

"...And for homework, please begin to write your dreams for the next week. Tonight you will be starting your 'Dream Journals'. Please submit them to me on Monday with all of your notes in order and all dreams interpreted fully. And for a bonus add an introduction to your journal. Have a nice day. Please watch your step on the way out Neville, dear." Professor Trelawney's misty and dreamy voice drifted through Hermione's head. That voice was an obvious hint that the Professor had no idea whatsoever about what she was talking about. She rolled her eyes as the rest of the class stood up with their bags and climbed down the trap door then followed them slowly, grumbling.

It was really frustrating. There was no one she could tell except Dumbledore. Ron and Harry would laugh, and Hagrid wouldn't take her seriously either. It was really too bad that they couldn't contact Snuffles again. As soon as that thought entered her mind, she wished it would leave. She would never be able to talk to Snuffles again. Sirius had died at the beginning of the summer. Harry had distanced himself for the last two weeks of school from Ron and Hermione. He hadn't sent any mail to either of his best friends the whole summer. Hermione found that very strange because he was stuck with the Dursley's all summer. She didn't know from experience, but the Muggle family was a very isolated crowd that really didn't take to the wizarding world. She sighed. This wasn't the time to feel sorry for Sirius or Harry. It was crucial to concentrate on her-self at the moment.

'_Well that's a bit selfish of you isn't it?' _

'_Well ya! But Harry's got everyone else concerned about him why should I be part of it?' _

'_Cause you're his best friend and it's your job!'_

'_He certainly doesn't care that I have problems though does he?'_ the bickering inside her head continued all through the hallway back to the Gryffindor common room. Unconsciously, her feet guided her to the entrance of the tower.

What she really needed was a way to survive through Divination. Firstly she couldn't stand the teacher, Professor Trelawney and secondly, the subject was crap and pointless. 'Why would you ever need to study such a useless subject?' But there was nothing Hermione could do about changing her classes now especially after the Headmaster helped her get back into this class so late in the year. She sighed again and headed into the common room.

"Ninja bees!" That was the new password for the week.

The Fat Lady's portrait swung open and revealed the round common room behind it. On one side of the room there was the fireplace, crackling merrily whilst the students floundered about and chatted, playing games like chess and gob stones and some just conversing. Harry sat curled up on a couch beside a table on the opposite side of the room. Ron was standing and trying on some dress robes that looked quite smashing on him and making a big fuss as to whether he looked like a girl. Harry was staring dismally at his best friend really not wanting to be his critic. Hermione strode over and sat next to Harry. He edged over slightly on the couch to give her some room for what he thought would be another avalanche of books. Nothing came.

"What are you two doing?"

"We're finishing up our Dream Journals," explained Harry, as he frowned at his blotted piece of parchment.

Hermione sighed, the Journals were assigned today, and they were due in a week. Those two were probably writing down every dream they could remember just to finish it off early.

"Trelawney wants one done for every night," complained Ron, "Can you believe her? One bloody page of parchment, double sided! That's fourteen pages!" He started counting out loud on his fingers for the benefit of his companions.

"We can count, Ron," reminded Harry, annoyed. Ron blushed and quieted down. He sat back down on the couch and pulled out another piece of parchment.

Hermione watched Ron writing furiously about a little creature called a Hobbit, who had to go on a dangerous quest to Mount Doom.

"Ron! That's a Muggle movie! You can't just call it your dream!" cried Hermione.

He grinned, "Can too! She's probably never heard of 'The Lord of the Rings' anyways. I could just say the whole thing signifies that I'm going on some sort of long journey, filled with danger, and I'll die a horrible death!" he said dramatically. "It's a great movie though, my dad took me to see it over the summer at some...err...moody teeter."

Hermione frowned, "Movie theatre?"

"That's gotta be...it," said Ron distractedly as he fiddled with the front of his new dress robes, wondering why he had an extra button at the top, and an extra hole at the bottom.

Harry, listening to the conversation, eyed Ron, and turned away with discomfort, at seeing him attempting to fix his new dress robes. Ron had gotten them this last morning with the mail, and an anonymous letter from someone who's handwriting looked exactly like Fred's saying that they hoped he wouldn't get too upset with these because they cost a lot of cash and they didn't want to buy him anymore. Ever since that, he would show off his new robes as long as he was in the Gryffindor tower.

Ron mumbled something incoherently, as he fumbled with the last button.

"What did you say?" said Hermione, as she reached over and fixed it.

"Just that you've seemed different lately. You're just doing random things. First you drop Divination cause it sounds, and I quote 'woolly', then you take it up again. Then you don't start your homework! What's gotten into you?"

"Nothing, I just need to rest," sighed Hermione.

Ron's eyes met hers with a quizzical expression. She pulled out a piece of parchment and a quill and wrote the title. "Fine! If it'll make you feel better I'll start the stupid journal!"

_This night couldn't get any worse._

_**Dear Dream Diary,**_

**_Monday, October 12th, 2004_**

_**Dreams are important to have, even though most seem quite unlikely, but they can relate directly to life itself. Some dreams tell of the future. Some show us the past. Some show the present and some are very random and don't relate to anything so they require deciphering. **_

_**The moon shone into the night. The last of the stars flickered out. A woman cried in the distance. Her baby was gone. The last of her family had disappeared. The spring beside her, stopped issuing water, the dog sitting beside her lay still. It didn't move at all. It was dead. She stopped hearing the mournful lament of the wind. She froze in place. She was dead. The grass turned grey. Dead. Every thing was dead. Nothing would ever move again, until a girl walked by. She was short with bushy, brown hair. This girl reminded me of myself. The aura about her showed superiority. She was scared. The deadness of the place was intimidating. A hooded stranger was walking, no, gliding towards her. She was crouching as a cold washed over her. The Dementor was there, two metres before her. There was nowhere to hide. He was advancing. Coming nearer and nearer.**_

"Here, read it." She tossed the parchment across the table between Harry and Ron. She was going to give them a chance.

"There, that sounds good doesn't it?" Ron said to her looking rather pleased. "Very convincing! It's almost as good as mine! But I've had four years more experience than you so I really can't blame you! We can't blame her can we Harry?" Harry started to snigger.

"No," said Harry, pondering, "We can't blame her at all, except for... Oh yeah!" he exclaimed, "She was the one that walked out on the class in the first place!"

The two boys rolled out of their seats laughing. Hermione, who would normally have got up and huffed off, leaving them, stayed in her seat. She glanced at Harry. He was beginning to talk and laugh like a normal boy again. He seemed to forget the burden that was laid on him for a while, as he sat laughing with Ron. She smiled to herself.

_He's back. Thank God he's back. I missed him so much._

There were times when all she could think of was Harry. When she was eating waffles or studying for History of Magic. There were times when all she could think about was Ron. Then there were those blessed times when she could concentrate on everything and not think about either of her two best friends. But the dreams were steadily becoming worse. The homework load wasn't improving either so she was swamped, with too much to do on not enough sleep.

As an afterthought, she realised the reason to their snickering.

_I told you there was no need to tell either of them! They really don't take me seriously when I write anything like this._

"Hey, you okay Hermione?" asked Ron

"Wha'?" she asked, startled out of her reverie.

"You seem sorta spaced out today," he said, with a worried expression on his face. "I mean you're really not paying attention. And this is the first time YOU haven't commented on OUR homework! I mean come on Hermione, get yourself together!"

"What are you talking about? I have no idea..." She glanced down at their Astronomy homework and saw the incompleteness of all of it. She sighed deeply. "Ron," she said tiredly, "You spelt Orion's constellation wrong, again." She looked at the other Journal, "Harry, change your introduction sentence. It's like an essay's intro, you need to basically summarize everything in the Journal."

Absently she started correcting spelling mistakes, and grammar errors. They grinned and immediately started to re-copy the journals she handed back to them.  
"Thanks Hermione!" they said in, with grins on their faces.

She sighed and went back to her daydreaming. All at once, her mind started to dance explosively with random dreams and images. She felt her body convulse and fall to the ground.

**_The noises were real; she could hear everything happening all at once. Pictures of forgotten times and unknown futures flashed by at lightning speed, but Hermione could see it all and hear it as if she had actually been there. Finally the pictures and the noises stopped changing. Her mind was left with a high-pitched screeching noise erupting from the depths of her memory. A single picture appeared behind her eyelids. It was Harry. He was in a deserted ally. There was an expensive looking box filled with jewellery. The gems were flowing over the sides and onto the pavement. Harry was holding a black ski mask in one hand and a club in the other. Jumping to conclusions wasn't her normal style but she was desperate for answers. Someone had been robbed. A girl wearing a long dress made of silk and lace was sitting on his knee. It all looked very old-fashioned. Hermione looked back at Harry. He was pale. He was too pale. She examined his clothes. He was wearing a suit jacket and pants, both black. They looked old and worn, but not ratty, something out of a history book. There was a black burned circle on his chest, as if branded with hot metal. He was dead. His eyes didn't give the pale gleam that eyes normally do, even in pictures. There was nothing behind his eyes that showed any sign of life. Hermione started weeping. The picture expanded and re-positioned to show the whole alley. With the better view of the street, Hermione could fully see Harry. He wasn't standing in the street he was lying in the dirt. All of his friends and their relatives were standing in the shadows of the ally. Some were crying and some stood transfixed upon the body. In the small crowd, she saw people that were highly unusual. Draco Malfoy and Severus Snape were standing there. Confused she began to yell curses and very colourful language at the picture. They had to have been the ones that killed him. The girl. Why was the girl the only one so near to Harry? A closer look at the girl answered her question. The female, who at first glance, could be mistaken for anyone was non other than Hermione, herself. The Hermione having the dream smiled at the affection she seemed like she was showing to Harry, but a closer look showed that she too had a black mark on her chest. Dead._ **

Hermione woke up whimpering. She clawed at herself, trying to remember more. See more. Screaming silently to her-self about the unfairness of this memory. She needed to see more. There was so much that she needed to interpret for some reason but she couldn't do with all the teenage feelings she was having and the weird adventures that kept happening to her and her two best friends. It didn't matter too much though, she could still remember each part of the memory in such detail that it was almost as if she had actually been there. The image was burnt into her brain and the back of her eyelids so she couldn't even forget it when she closed her eyes. As soon as she saw Harry standing over her, she grabbed him around the neck and stared sobbing into his shoulder repeating jumbled words about never seeing him again.

"What? Hermione what's wrong? 'MIONE GET OFF!!!...RON, LITTLE HELP HERE!" Appalled by Hermione's outward behaviour, he seemed to be frozen on the spot and failed to notice that Harry was in serious discomfort. "RON!!!"

"Right, sorry Harry. Hermione get off him, he's fine! There's...nothing...wrong...with...Harry...!" Ron pulled at Hermione's shoulders and shirt. Gathering herself together, she pulled herself off of Harry. This was going to be weird. Still looking pale she made to stand up but failed in her effort. Both boys grabbed her under her arms before she fell. They dragged her to the chair closest to them and set her down softly.

"Man she's light!" Harry stared down at the frail body of his best friend. "Has she been eating?" Hermione passed out again, but this time she was silent, not thrashing about. It had scared both men silly. Harry thought he could hear into her mind. She was screaming for help. He knelt beside the chair and felt her forehead. It felt clammy and very cold.

"What? Eating, ya! Some mornings I can't keep up with her. Harry is she going to be ok?" pleaded Ron "Please tell me she's going to be ok!" Ron began to go into hysterics. Harry helped Hermione to her feet and out the portrait hole.

"We need to get her to the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey will know what to do."

The boys took her up to the hospital wing and lay down her on the bed nearest to the door.  
"Madam Pomfrey, we need your help." Harry said urgently. They walked to the entrance of the healer's office. She was bent over her desk taking notes, as a distressed person in the shadows was talking quite frantically. He stopped abruptly when he saw Harry and Ron standing at the door.

"WHAT DO YOU WANT?" demanded the man?

"Madam Pomfrey," said Harry addressing her, "Hermione is sick. She..."

"I will contact you later with more information and the progress over the summer, when nosy, busy bodies are not here to eavesdrop!" Lucius Malfoy snapped and stomped out of the office. He walked up to a curtained bed, peeked inside and left without another word. Worried sick, Ron didn't even start to ponder the reason Malfoy was at Hogwarts right now.

"M-madam Pomfrey, help Hermione. Mental breakdown. In the common room. Just collapsed on the floor. P-please help her." Ron was going into hysterics again. His voice was rising to an unnatural high. Harry put his hands on both shoulders of his best friend before he started jumping around like a loony. Although he already sounded like a balloon having it's air let out, a visual form was not a good additive. Harry remained calm. He knew the school healer could help Hermione. She had helped him grow bones back into his arm overnight so Hermione would be easy...hopefully.

"What's this child? Granger is sick? Oh dear me, this is bad. Potter go get the Headmaster, I'm sure he'll want to know what's happened." Harry didn't wait; he rushed out the door and down the marble staircase until he reached the headmasters office. He wasn't really sure how he got into the office, but he must have said something right because he managed to get past the statue.

"Professor! Professor Dumbledore! Are you here?"

Fawkes was sitting on his golden perch, but flew to Harry when he heard the distress in his voice. The magnificent golden phoenix chirped a low note deep in his throat. Apparently this was a better signal than Harry's yelling because Dumbledore appeared at the top level of the office. He majestically flowed down the stairs in a hurried fashion. Fawkes' whistle obviously was more than a summoning signal because Professor Dumbledore didn't even wait for an explanation; he just left the room leaving Harry in silent astonishment. Harry caught on pretty fast when Fawkes left his shoulder for his roost. He rushed after the Headmaster, and caught up to him out of breath. Harry explained what had happened to Hermione, and Dumbledore gave him an urgent, piercing look.

They reached the hospital wing at a run. Madam Pomfrey was not tending to Hermione, she seemed to be fine, but Ron was still having trouble breathing and needed help. Harry rushed over and took over for the healer. Madam Pomfrey was able now to tend to her real patients.

Dumbledore was sure that Hermione was perfectly fine to talk to. He shooed everyone out of the room. Harry and Ron protested but there was no lenience. They left Hermione in safe hands, and exited the room.

But on their way out, they heard:

"Alright, Mr. Malfoy, Miss. Granger, please tell me everything you two have experienced in the past week. We'll see if you two have something in common..."

A/N: All right I know this wasn't the greatest beginning I could have made but I'm really stressed with school and stuff so right now this is the best it's going to get. I'm really sorry to everyone that was either expecting this a long time ago or anyone that wanted it longer, I promise I'll try and do better next time. Special thanks goes out to Nemo for being my outstanding editor and also Joycey because she was the one that motivated me to start writing on fan fiction. ï I love you both so much!


End file.
